The Phantom Coach: A Connoisseur's Collection of the Best Victorian Ghost Stories

Ghost stories date back centuries, but those written in the Victorian era have a unique atmosphere and dark beauty. Michael Sims, whose previous Victorian collections Dracula’s Guest (vampires) and The Dead Witness (detectives) have been widely praised, has gathered twelve of the best stories about humanity’s oldest supernatural obsession. The Phantom Coach includes tales by a surprising and often legendary cast, including Charles Dickens, Margaret Oliphant, Henry James, Rudyard Kipling, and Arthur Conan Doyle, as well as lost gems by forgotten masters such as Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and W. F. Harvey. Amelia B. Edwards’s chilling story gives the collection its title, while Ambrose Bierce ("The Moonlit Road"), Elizabeth Gaskell ("The Old Nurse’s Story"), and W. W. Jacobs ("The Monkey’s Paw") will turn you white as a sheet. With a skillful introduction to the genre and notes on each story by Sims, The Phantom Coach is a spectacular collection of ghostly Victorian thrills.

Chilling Ghost Stories

Andrew Sachs reads these four classic stories of suspense - "The Signalman" by Charles Dickens, "The Haunted Doll's House" by M. R. James, "The Room in the Tower" by E. F. Benson, and "The Bus-Conductor" by E. F. Benson. These spine-tingling tales, from the golden age of the ghost story, are sure to leave you with a creeping sense of dread.

Ghost Stories, Volume One

Sir Derek Jacobi reads a collection of tales from the master of ghost stories, M. R. James, whose stories have for many years inspired the BBC's A Ghost Story for Christmas TV adaptations. M. R. James was described as "a man who, in company with Sheridan le Fanu, is the best ghost-story writer England has ever produced".

Great Classic Ghost Stories: Sixteen Unabridged Classics

This collection of short ghost stories includes some of the best-known classics in the genre, as well as some that may be new to ghost story fans. Includes: ”The Damned Thing by Ambrose Bierce, ”The Empty House" by Algernon Blackwood, ”The Consequences" by Willa Cather, ”How It Happened" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, ”A Ghost" by Guy De Maupassant, and more.

The Elementals

After a bizarre and disturbing incident at the funeral of matriarch Marian Savage, the McCray and Savage families look forward to a restful and relaxing summer at Beldame, on Alabama's Gulf Coast, where three Victorian houses loom over the shimmering beach. Two of the houses are habitable, while the third is slowly and mysteriously being buried beneath an enormous dune of blindingly white sand. But though long uninhabited, the third house is not empty. Inside, something deadly lies in wait.

Can Such Things Be?

Prepare yourself for the shocking, the strange, and the terrifying in Ambrose Bierce’s 1893 story collection Can Such Things Be? One of the greatest masters of horror brings you 25 tales of the supernatural and the unexplained. Whether in stories of ghosts sending desperate warnings to their human counterparts, psychics attempting to bridge unknown dimensions, howling werewolves, or a robot who takes on a life of his own, Bierce plumbs the depths of fear and fascination.

Ghost Stories, Volume 2

A second collection of tales from the master of ghost stories, M. R. James, whose stories have for many years inspired the BBC's A Ghost Story for Christmas TV adaptations. This volume includes 'A Warning to the Curious', 'The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral', 'The Mezzotint', and 'A Neighbour's Landmark'.

H. P. Lovecraft is arguably the most important horror writer of the 20th century. Culled from his 1927 essay "Supernatural Horror in Literature”, Lovecraft acknowledges those authors and stories that he feels are the very finest the horror field has to offer, including Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, Henry James, Rudyard Kipling, Bram Stoker, Robert Louis Stevenson, Guy de Maupassant, Ambrose Bierce, and Arthur Conan Doyle. This chilling collection includes 20 works, each prefaced by Lovecraft's own opinions and insights in each author’s work.

The Empty House and Other Ghost Stories

An abandoned house whose horrific past is reenacted for those who dare visit; a terrifying trip down the Danube River; a malevolent half-beast creature who abducts a member of a hunting party; and a tale of paranoia, mental deterioration, and all-consuming feelings of doom: Here are four feverish, spine-tingling tales that will chill the blood and make the flesh creep. The collection includes "The Empty House," "The Willows," "The Listener", and "The Wendigo".

A Winter Haunting

A once-respected college professor and novelist, Dale Stewart has sabotaged his career and his marriage - and now darkness is closing in on him. In the last hours of Halloween, he has returned to the dying town of Elm Haven, his boyhood home, where he hopes to find peace in isolation.

Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places

Colin Dickey is on the trail of America's ghosts. Crammed into old houses and hotels, abandoned prisons and empty hospitals, the spirits that linger continue to capture our collective imagination, but why? His own fascination piqued by a house hunt in Los Angeles that revealed derelict foreclosures and "zombie homes", Dickey embarks on a journey across the continental United States to decode and unpack the American history repressed in our most famous haunted places.

This volume features William F Harvey's original undead hand story "The Beast with Five Fingers" that sparked many movies including Sam Raimi's "The Evil Dead". Poe's classic "The Tell Tale Heart" is joined by Lovecraft's creepy tale of alienation "The Outsider", and a chilling Dickens ghost story "The Signalman".

Ghosts: Edith Wharton's Gothic Tales

Beneath the brilliance that was behind The Age of Innocence and Ethan Frome was a dark side. A dark side which produced magnificent tales of the unseen influences in our lives, such as "Mr. Jones", "The Eyes", "Kerfol", "The Ladie's Maid's Bell", and "The Looking Glass".

Burnt Offerings: Valancourt 20th Century Classics

Ben and Marian Rolfe are desperate to escape a stifling summer in their tiny Brooklyn apartment, so when they get the chance to rent a mansion in upstate New York for the entire summer for only $900, it's an offer that's too good to refuse. There's only one catch: behind a strange and intricately carved door in a distant wing of the house lives elderly Mrs. Allardyce, and the Rolfes will be responsible for preparing her meals. But Mrs. Allardyce never seems to emerge from her room, and it soon becomes clear that something weird and terrifying is happening in the house.

The Nameless Dark

The Nameless Dark debuts a major new voice in contemporary weird fiction. Within these minutes, you'll find whispers of the familiar ghosts of the classic pulps - Lovecraft, Bradbury, Smith - blended with Grau's uniquely macabre, witty storytelling, securing his place at the table amid this current Renaissance of literary horror.

Year's Best Hardcore Horror, Volume 1

Editors Randy Chandler and Cheryl Mullenax put the call out to horror writers and editors of extreme stories, the hardcore stuff that breaks boundaries and trashes taboos, the transgressive tales you can't "unread" (as Chuck Palahniuk says). Some of the stories you'll find here are loaded with very graphic descriptions of violence, sex, and depravities, while others may contain only one shocking moment of brutality. In others, the hardcore aspect may be less graphic and subtler than you might expect.

Certain Dark Things

In her debut short story collection, M.J. Pack offers up a new breed of terror sure to delight any true horror fan. Don’t miss out on tales of telepathic twins, a campfire ghost story gone terribly wrong, pills that induce life-threatening nightmares, and the disturbing new sideshow at Coney Island: Lady Alligator. Take a haunting trip down infamous Bubblehead Road and follow Danny around the country as he’s pursued by unseen (and unrelenting) creatures.

Haunted Legends

Darkly thrilling, these 20 new ghost stories have all the chills and power of traditional ghost stories, but each tale is a unique retelling of an urban legend from the world over. Multiple award-winning editor Ellen Datlow and award-nominated author and editor Nick Mamatas recruited Jeffrey Ford, Ramsey Campbell, Joe R. Lansdale, Caitlin Kiernan, Catherynne M. Valente, Kit Reed, Ekaterina Sedia, and 13 other fine writers to create stories unlike any they've written before.

Ghost Story

For four aging men in the terror-stricken town of Milburn, New York, an act inadvertently carried out in their youth has come back to haunt them. Now they are about to learn what happens to those who believe they can bury the past - and get away with murder. Peter Straub's classic best seller is a work of "superb horror" (Washington Post Book World) that, like any good ghost story, stands the test of time - and conjures our darkest fears and nightmares.

The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard

Robert E. Howard, renowned creator of Conan the Barbarian, was also a master at conjuring tales of hair-raising horror. In a career spanning only 12 years, Howard wrote more than 100 stories, with his most celebrated work appearing in Weird Tales, the preeminent pulp magazine of the era.

Publisher's Summary

Sixteen classic stories from masters of the genre: "The Judge's House", by Bram Stoker; "A Jug of Sirup", by Ambrose Bierce; "The Reconciliation", by Lafcadio Hearn; "The Woman With a Candle" by W. Bourne Cooke; "The Ebony Frame", by E. Nesbit; "On the Northern Ice", by Elia W. Peattie; "The Haunted Doll's House", by M. R. James; "The Old House in Vauxhall Walk", by Charlotte Riddell; "The Underground Ghost", by John Berwick Harwood; "Haunted", by Anon (from Tinsley's Annual); "The Last of Squire Ennismore" by J. H. Riddell; "The Story of the Green House, Wallington", by Allen Upward; "The Vacant Lot", by M. E. Wilkins Freeman; "The Real and the Counterfeit", by Louisa Baldwin; "The Haunted Mill", by Jerome K. Jerome; and "The Chippendale Mirror", by E. F. Benson. Read by Hayward Morse, Liza Ross, Garrick Hagon, Nigel Lambert, Paul Panting, and Sean Barrett.

I was surprised with this audiobook - it has a good variety of stories, some of which I haven't "read" before! I was worried about the narration, as there are quite a few voice actors reading the stories, but I was very impressed with the quality! Great narration on all of the stories. The ones that really stood out for me were "The Judge's House", "The Haunted Doll's House", "The Story of the Green House, Wallington" and "The Chippendale Mirror". Some of the stories I didn't care for, but most were hits so I consider it a good purchase. Oh, and no "The Signalman"!!!! WOO! :-)

THE JUDGE'S HOUSE is about a maths student seeking solitude in an old house, where he hopes to study for his exams. Sadly, the place isn't exactly conducive to his plans.

A JUG OF SIROP is Bierce's tale of a man who really loves his work, even beyond death.

A RECONCILIATION is set in Japan. A man regrets leaving what we'd now call a "starter wife," the woman he traded in for higher status and success. He sets out to find her again, but things do not go as he imagines.

In the autumn of 1900, an amateur antiquarian stays in a forested country area where he discovers an old sexton inclined to chat about the old days. When the sexton talks about "an old and ghastly woman that walks the house at midnight," the visitor laughs about THE WOMAN WITH THE CANDLE.

Paranormal romance is nothing new, kids. THE EBONY FRAME is an old school example. A young man who fancies himself finds his great expectations met admirably when he inherits a property from his aunt. He regrets pledging himself to his fiancee, his "good little woman," and considers he might do better. While going through the stock of antiques and bric-a-brac in the attic, he finds evidence that there is a far more bewitching prospect at hand. Paranormal romance, drama, and a touch of reincarnation with a dash of bargaining with the devil.

ON THE NORTHERN ICE is an all-too-innocent tale of love, friendship, and loyalty. When a young many sets out to travel to Echo Bay on ice skates, he has an unusual experience...

THE HAUNTED DOLL'S HOUSE is a small James masterwork about an antique collector who gets more than he bargained for when he takes home a Strawberry Hill Gothick doll's house, "the very quintessence of Horace Walpole."

Following a fight with his father, a young man is filled with self-pity and anger as he wanders about in the rain. When he runs into an old family retainer, he goes with him and spends the night alone in THE OLD HOUSE IN VAUXHALL WALK.

THE UNDERGROUND GHOST appears in a Cheshire salt mine. When a young "rising junior at the bar" visits his uncle's mine which he might inherit someday, he becomes lost and encounters a helpful young lady.

A statesman on the way to convention is hindered by bad weather and forced to take lodging in a rather downmarket place. When he settles into his room, a ghost appears who demands vengeance. But can the ghost actually get a politician to do something in HAUNTED?

THE LAST OF SQUIRE ENNISMORE is a masterful performance for Barrett. The old squire was so evil he could scarcely have become worse when he returns to the house near the sea. Following a shipwreck, he takes to drinking with a stranger he believes was left behind...but with whom has he really been spending his evenings?

A spiky Mr. Giltstrap wants an estate agent to sell an unwanted property, THE GREEN HOUSE AT WALLINGFORD. The agent buys the property at a loss, paying no attention to the strange gossip which attends the house. He takes his secretary, with her mum as chaperone, and finds out more than he ever wanted to know about the place.

THE VACANT LOT is a rather dull story about a family's move to a haunted area.

THE REAL AND THE COUNTERFEIT is a story by now so familiar through its continual reappearance in telly since the 1950's that it's hard to consider it might have been original once. In it, Will Musgrave and his pals take a practical joke involving a ghost just a bit too far.

Jerome tells about a miserly miller who supposedly left a fortune in gold in THE HAUNTED MILL. Of course, this being JKJ, absurd comedy ensues.

THE CHIPPENDALE MIRROR is classic Benson at his best. When a newly well-to-do young man brings an antique mirror into his new Adam-style residence, he doesn't realize it will plunge him into the heart of an unsolved murder case.

Good old Victorian yarns. Wordy yes, but this is what I like and these stories give you the creeps without violence and technology.

Each work is read by a different narrator, some better than others but all are capable of injecting spooky atmosphere into the works which are as different as the they are at reading.

These writers take you into the world as it was over a hundred years or more ago, when radios did not exist and we relied on our magnificent imagination to do all of the visual effects. If you are looking for quick fix horror these are not for you. These stories are a treasure and perfect for the long dark evenings with a drink of your choice and the phone switched off.

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